With the advances that have been made in semiconductor technology in recent years, extremely complex electrical circuits can be manufactured relatively inexpensively. As a result these circuits are assembled into more and more complex components. As the components become more complex, the demands for signal communication among them tend to increase in terms of the number of signals required and the frequency of the signals.
The electrical cables providing communication between different electronic components have thus tended to become increasingly expensive. One technique that has been developed to decrease the cost and manageability of multiple wire connections is flat ribbon cables. Such cables maintain the individual wires in fixed relationship to one another so that they can be handled as a single unit and so that any given wires can be readily selected and distinguished from other wires.
A known technique for making flat ribbon cables is to use a woven mesh to secure the wires in a fixed relationship. U.S. Pat. No. 4,818,820 to LaRock and U.S. Pat. No. 4,159,394 to Ross disclose arrangements in which a flat ribbon cable is formed as a woven web. LaRock increases the number of wires by using a double layer of flat ribbon cables with the two layers being separated by a copper sheet.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,808,771 to Orr, Jr. and U.S. Pat. No. 3,495,025 to Ross teach further arrangements of flat woven wire cable in which three sections of a woven mesh cable are fan folded with the mesh extending in serpentine fashion to form a multilayer cable. While these arrangements provide a compact physical configuration, there is no shielding of the wires carried by the cable and the frequency of signals communicated over the cable is limited because of cross coupling between different conductors within the cable.
Other arrangements are known wherein insulation material extends between adjacent wires to maintain the wires in fixed relationship to one another and form a flat ribbon cable. See, for example, Steve Hunter et al., "The Application Specific Connector: Communications", Connection Technology, April 1990, pp. 43-45; U.S. Pat. No. 4,234,759 to Harlow, U.S. Pat. No. 4,375,379 to Luetzow, and U.S. Pat. No. 4,564,723 to Lang and U.S. Pat. No. 3,798,346 to Kreuzer.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,694,563 to Monds et al. teaches an arrangement in which an insulated metal conduit maintains the individual wires in fixed relationship to one another. U.S. Pat. No. 3,430,337 to Kelly discloses the use of a noninsulated metal shield.
In view of the ever growing complexity of electrical and electronic components and the signals that must be communicated between different components, a continuing need exists for low cost, multiple wire cable systems that can carry a large number of independent, high frequency signals. This invention provides electrical cables and a method of manufacture that results in an improved ratio of performance to cost.